664 MR J. T. CUNNINGHAM AND MR G. A RAMAGE ON THE 



Lanice conchilega, Mgn. (Pallas). 



Nereis concMlegd, Pallas, Misc. Zool., p. 131. 



Terebella conchilega, Savigny, Syst. Annel. ; Johnston, Brit. Mus. Cat. 



Terebella littoralis seu arenaria, The Sand Mason, Daly ell, Powers of the 



Creator. 

 Lanice conchilega, Malmgren, Nord. Hafs-Annulater, p. 380 ; M'Intosh, 



Fauna of St Andrews. 



Only one species of the genus is known, and it would be better to dismiss 

 the genus and call the species Terebella conchilega. Johnston, in his descrip- 

 tion of T. conchilega, does not mention the fringes at the mouth of the tube ; 

 but his original is Nereis conchilega, Pallas, which is undoubtedly this species, 

 as the following quotation from the Miscellanea Zoologica will show: — "Subtus 

 taenia prominens plana, pulchre rubra ad caput rotundato initio incipit, ultraque 

 mediam corporis longitudinem producta, angustatur, tandemque evanescit. 

 Caput animalis squamis quatuor planiusculis carnosis munitum est ; 

 quarum binae majores contiguae semiovatae ; exteriorque ad latera utrinque 

 una cui setae dorsales primi paris respondent." Johnston's T. littoralis is 

 simply Daly ell's T. littoralis seu arenaria; and although the latter counted 

 only 16 fascicles of chaetae, he mentions a "broad, taper, smooth, velvet 

 bright carmine stripe along the belly between a transverse row of ellipses," 

 which proves that his Sand Mason is our Lanice conchilega. Dalyell also 

 mentions the fringe of branched filaments, made of particles of sand, round the 

 mouth of the tube which the worm inhabits : he says this fringe occurs at both 

 ends of the tube, but this must be a mistake. 



Habits. — The tube is made of particles of sand, and at Granton we have 

 always found it buried vertically in sand, with only an inch or so protruding 

 above the surface. The tube is very long, and as the animal is always at the 

 deep end of it, careful digging is required to extract it uninjured. The 

 filaments of the fringe are hollow, and when the head of the worm is protruded 

 the tentacles are partially contained in them, and so protected. The projecting 

 part of the tube, with its tuft of tubules, has a very characteristic appearance 

 on a sandy shore, and there are probably few sandy shores on the coast of 

 Europe where these tufts are not to be seen. The worm also occurs to some 

 distance beyond low-water mark (vide PI. XLIII. fig. 26). 



For an account of the nephridia, which in this species form a continuous 

 tube on each side by coalescence, see a paper " On some Points in the 

 Anatomy of Polychaeta," by J. T. Cunningham, Quart. Jour. Micr. Sci, 1887. 



